Genre Research (Marian Hassan and Faraz Maqbool)

A thriller is a film that restlessly pursues a single-minded goal. It gives the audience thrills and keeps the audience cliff-hanging at the 'edge of their seats' as the plot builds towards a climax. The tension usually builds when the main character(s) is placed in a frightening situation or dangerous mission from which an escape seems impossible. Life itself is threatened, usually because the principal character is unsuspecting or unknowingly involved in a dangerous or potentially deadly situation. Plots of thrillers involve characters which come into conflict with each other - the menace is sometimes abstract or shadowy.
Thrillers are often hybrids - there are suspense-thrillers, action- or adventure- thrillers, sci-fi thrillers e.g. Alien (1979), crime-caper thrillers e.g. The French Connection (1971)), western-thrillers e.g. High Noon (1952)), film-noir thrillers e.g. Double Indemnity (1944)), even romantic comedy-thrillers e.g. Safety Last (1923)).
Another similar genre is the horror film genre e.g. Halloween (1978)), also designed to bring forth tension and suspense, taking the viewer through agony and panic. Suspense-thrillers come in all shapes and forms: such as murder mysteries, private eye tales, chase thrillers, courtroom and legal thrillers, erotic thrillers, surreal cult-film soap operas, and atmospheric, plot-twisting psychodramas. Thrillers keep the emphasis away from the gangster, crime, or the detective in the crime-related plot, focusing more on the suspense and danger that is caused.
Characters in thrillers include convicts, criminals, stalkers, assassins, down-on-their-luck losers, innocent victims (often on the run), prison inmates, menaced women, characters with dark pasts, psychotic individuals, terrorists, cops and escaped cons, fugitives, private eyes, drifters, duplicitous individuals, people involved in twisted relationships, world-weary men and women, psycho-fiends, and more. The themes of thrillers frequently include terrorism, political conspiracy, pursuit, or romantic triangles leading to murder.

The Codes and Conventions

It is very important to follow the Codes and Conventions of the genre in which you are creating your movie. This is because it allows the audience to understand what type of movie that they are watching. An example would be that if they were watching a Horror movie there would be props, lighting, iconography, music, etc that would be used to convey that type of movie, so there would be scary/eerie music being played. However in a thriller movie there are certain Codes and Conventions that have to be watched out for, these are:

- Quick cuts and changes of the camera angle
Directors in many thriller movies like to use quick cuts and a vast amount of camera angles to keep the pace of the movie fast, and build suspense and create tension for the audience. it keeps the audience interested and focused on the movie.

- Surprises and twists
This is a very important convention that must be used in a thriller as it is a way to keep the viewers of the TV Show or Movie guessing and so that they are literally on the edge of their seats waiting to see what happens next. The show Lost does this spectacularly by leaving its viewers wanting more and more after each episode that they watch and keeping them in suspense until the next episode is released. It also keeps the viewer interested in the show and allows for shocking storylines that the viewers did not expect.

- Sound
Sound plays a key role in thrillers as it is a way to convey certain feelings to the audience and so in effect it is able to keep the viewer enthralled in the movie. There are many different types of sound that can be used such as Synchronous, Asynchronous, Diegetic, Non-Diegetic, etc. It can be used to evoke the feeling of suspense and tension in the viewer.

- Props
The props used also are able to convey to the audience what type of movie that they are watching. it is common to see guns, knives, stairs and also mirrors in thrillers, if the director chooses not to follow the conventions on the props used then the audience may not find the film very interesting as it does not seem realistic to the genre being portrayed.

- Editing techniques
Depending on the genre of movie being made there are sometimes some editing techniques that are associated with those genres. An example would be how Flashbacks are used in thrillers such as Phonebooth or lost. It is usually used to portray the past of a character so that the audience knows more about this character and can maybe even take a liking to that character through some sort of connection. Lost the TV Show makes great use of the editing technique such as the flashback.

- Effect on the Audience
A good Thriller really does leave the audience thinking and it may even be putting forward some moral or ethical decisions that may have the viewer contradicting their own beliefs. This is not found in all thrillers but it is found in a few, one such example would be the movie Shooter. it makes the viewer think about what they would do if they were in the position of a character in the movie or TV Show and it makes them start to think about what they would do or could do in that particular situation.

- Antagonists Point of view
Thrillers such as Phone booth have the audience seeing things in not only the protagonists view but also the antagonists view. Phonebooth may not be seen as a conventionial thriller but one convention that links this movie to being a thriller is that it shows the story from the antagonists point of view. this type of movie also plays with your mind and can be classed as a Psychological thriller.